Nothing fancy with this batch, just a replay of some of my all time favorite games, most of these games are yearly replays and will never get old no matter how many times I play them,

This was the first time I played Batman returns on SNES, the game was a pleasant surprise, great beat em up that is marred a bit by the side scrolling sections that are mostly fairly mediocre. I did enjoy it and will re-visit at some point but I wish the whole thing was more beat em up.

Sarge wrote:Anyway, I went through The Legendary Axe. Decent game, way too hard at the end. I abused save states like crazy. I think I'd have to play a lot more carefully to make it through legit.

Legendary axe has one of the worst difficulty spikes in the history of gaming. The game is moderately challenging and then all of a sudden you hit the last level and there is a room for every letter of the alphabet, it drags on way too long and is a really sour end to an otherwise great game.

The reason I never replay legendary axe is because of the horrific last level, and even with save state abuse, it is simply not fun to play. Have you played the sequel? I actually enjoyed the sequel a lot more than the first, maybe because I owned the sequel as a kid and not the original.

Re: Games Beaten 2018

Posted: Tue Feb 20, 2018 9:50 pm

by PresidentLeever

nullPointer wrote:

PresidentLeever wrote:My poor eyes.. and in jpeg too! That should be covered in the forum rules imho.

Not sure I follow you here. Too many images? Too large of images? Hopefully I'm not stirring some unforeseen pot; just not sure what you're getting at.

No worries, it wasn't directed at you and I wasn't being serious about the rules but those GBC shots do look pretty nasty when blown up and in jpeg format, which blurs them in a way that doesn't help with the very pronounced dithering used in those games.

As was the case with Army Men and Army Men 2 on Game Boy Color, Army Men Air Combat on Game Boy Color is an extremely simplified port of the larger game of the same name. Rather than being a port of a PC game, however, this time it's a port of a Nintendo 64 and PlayStation game (although the game also released on PC). For the main platform releases, this game was a big deal because it was the first Army Men game to be made in a 3D engine where everything is rendered in real time. Obviously the Game Boy Color wasn't going to be pulling off any 3D stunts, but even so, I have to admit that this feels a bit like a step back for the Game Boy Color Army Men games in some ways.

Rather than playing as Sarge as you did in Army Men and Army Men 2, you play as Captain Blade this time, the Green Army's star helicopter pilot. I haven't actually played the N64 or PS1 versions of the game yet, so I can't speak to how closely this port follows the story, but from what I've read, it's like the Army Men port in that in follows the basic story pretty well but in a significantly simpler form. For the most part, the story in this port, at least, feels rather haphazard and disconnected. You're basically running a series of loosely connected missions that never really feel part of a greater whole. You have to defend a Green base from a Tan attack, resupply a Green factory, destroy a Tan battleship, protect a Green convoy, save Sarge from a Tan prison camp, etc. None of them feel out of place, but the whole game feels extremely episodic rather than serial.

Visually, we're looking at about the same quality as Army Men 2. Nothing looks great, and it still resembles an Atari 5200 game, but it's decent enough given the hardware. The helicopters look pretty decent, and all three of the playable choppers in the game have distinct designs aside from stat differences. The music is the biggest upgrade. It's still not an award winning soundtrack or anything, but it's much less repetitive than what we had in Army Men or Army Men 2. I wouldn't say that I enjoyed it, per se, but I definitely didn't find myself getting sick of it like I did in the previous two games. Unfortunately the controls took a big step back. The helicopter feels like it has some momentum which is nice from a realism perspective, but at the same time, it makes it a pain to control, and you're flying a helicopter four inches long and made out of plastic; is realism really high on our priority list? I suppose in a lot of ways that comes down to personal preference, but I found it to be far more of a hindrance than a boon.

Army Men: Air Combat for Game Boy Color is decent game by Army Men standards, but it falls short of Army Men 2 in playability and fun. The controls took a hit in the transition to air combat, in my opinion, but the visuals are on par with Army Men 2, and the music is a marked improvement. Some of the missions can be extremely frustrating - escort missions suck in any game, and they're especially cumbersome here - but the game does, at the very least, give you more mission variety than Army Men or Army Men 2 did. I wouldn't go out of my way to find this unless you're an Army Men or Game Boy Color enthusiast, but there are definitely worse games on the system.

Re: Games Beaten 2018

Posted: Wed Feb 21, 2018 12:01 pm

by marurun

pook99 wrote:

Sarge wrote:Anyway, I went through The Legendary Axe. Decent game, way too hard at the end. I abused save states like crazy. I think I'd have to play a lot more carefully to make it through legit.

Legendary axe has one of the worst difficulty spikes in the history of gaming. The game is moderately challenging and then all of a sudden you hit the last level and there is a room for every letter of the alphabet, it drags on way too long and is a really sour end to an otherwise great game.

The reason I never replay legendary axe is because of the horrific last level, and even with save state abuse, it is simply not fun to play. Have you played the sequel? I actually enjoyed the sequel a lot more than the first, maybe because I owned the sequel as a kid and not the original.

That difficulty is mostly just due to the length of the final level if you take the wrong path and end up looping back.

I have an obsessive love for this game, because it uses the Astynax weapon meter but is a much better game, and when you are powered up it doesn't take long to deliver a pretty solid attack, and unlike many weapon meter games, the basic uncharged attack isn't worthless. It's weak, but it has its uses. One of the two game designers was also responsible for Astynax (Surprised? I wasn't!). And the best part is the soundtrack. Jun Chikuma was one of the composers (on loan from Hudson, probably), and she's always a joy to listen to. Her music is always so unique compared to other game composers. She's much more comfortable with complex rhythms and spots of silence than other composers.

Re: Games Beaten 2018

Posted: Wed Feb 21, 2018 6:12 pm

by pook99

marurun wrote:

pook99 wrote:

Sarge wrote:Anyway, I went through The Legendary Axe. Decent game, way too hard at the end. I abused save states like crazy. I think I'd have to play a lot more carefully to make it through legit.

Legendary axe has one of the worst difficulty spikes in the history of gaming. The game is moderately challenging and then all of a sudden you hit the last level and there is a room for every letter of the alphabet, it drags on way too long and is a really sour end to an otherwise great game.

The reason I never replay legendary axe is because of the horrific last level, and even with save state abuse, it is simply not fun to play. Have you played the sequel? I actually enjoyed the sequel a lot more than the first, maybe because I owned the sequel as a kid and not the original.

That difficulty is mostly just due to the length of the final level if you take the wrong path and end up looping back.

I have an obsessive love for this game, because it uses the Astynax weapon meter but is a much better game, and when you are powered up it doesn't take long to deliver a pretty solid attack, and unlike many weapon meter games, the basic uncharged attack isn't worthless. It's weak, but it has its uses. One of the two game designers was also responsible for Astynax (Surprised? I wasn't!). And the best part is the soundtrack. Jun Chikuma was one of the composers (on loan from Hudson, probably), and she's always a joy to listen to. Her music is always so unique compared to other game composers. She's much more comfortable with complex rhythms and spots of silence than other composers.

Astyanax is one of my favorite non-mainstream nes games. I frequently replay it and can see its influence on lengendary axe. I really do enjoy legendary axe, which is why I am so sour over the last level, as it just sucks the fun out of the game for me. Having a level that long which also has maze elements that can potentially leave you playing it for hours is just really poor game design. If you play it a lot and have it memorized I am sure it is not as bad as I remember it, but it is not fun for someone like me who just likes to go back and revisit the game every couple of years.

As was the case with Army Men and Army Men 2 on Game Boy Color, Army Men Air Combat on Game Boy Color is an extremely simplified port of the larger game of the same name. Rather than being a port of a PC game, however, this time it's a port of a Nintendo 64 and PlayStation game (although the game also released on PC). For the main platform releases, this game was a big deal because it was the first Army Men game to be made in a 3D engine where everything is rendered in real time. Obviously the Game Boy Color wasn't going to be pulling off any 3D stunts, but even so, I have to admit that this feels a bit like a step back for the Game Boy Color Army Men games in some ways.

Rather than playing as Sarge as you did in Army Men and Army Men 2, you play as Captain Blade this time, the Green Army's star helicopter pilot. I haven't actually played the N64 or PS1 versions of the game yet, so I can't speak to how closely this port follows the story, but from what I've read, it's like the Army Men port in that in follows the basic story pretty well but in a significantly simpler form. For the most part, the story in this port, at least, feels rather haphazard and disconnected. You're basically running a series of loosely connected missions that never really feel part of a greater whole. You have to defend a Green base from a Tan attack, resupply a Green factory, destroy a Tan battleship, protect a Green convoy, save Sarge from a Tan prison camp, etc. None of them feel out of place, but the whole game feels extremely episodic rather than serial.

Visually, we're looking at about the same quality as Army Men 2. Nothing looks great, and it still resembles an Atari 5200 game, but it's decent enough given the hardware. The helicopters look pretty decent, and all three of the playable choppers in the game have distinct designs aside from stat differences. The music is the biggest upgrade. It's still not an award winning soundtrack or anything, but it's much less repetitive than what we had in Army Men or Army Men 2. I wouldn't say that I enjoyed it, per se, but I definitely didn't find myself getting sick of it like I did in the previous two games. Unfortunately the controls took a big step back. The helicopter feels like it has some momentum which is nice from a realism perspective, but at the same time, it makes it a pain to control, and you're flying a helicopter four inches long and made out of plastic; is realism really high on our priority list? I suppose in a lot of ways that comes down to personal preference, but I found it to be far more of a hindrance than a boon.

Army Men: Air Combat for Game Boy Color is decent game by Army Men standards, but it falls short of Army Men 2 in playability and fun. The controls took a hit in the transition to air combat, in my opinion, but the visuals are on par with Army Men 2, and the music is a marked improvement. Some of the missions can be extremely frustrating - escort missions suck in any game, and they're especially cumbersome here - but the game does, at the very least, give you more mission variety than Army Men or Army Men 2 did. I wouldn't go out of my way to find this unless you're an Army Men or Game Boy Color enthusiast, but there are definitely worse games on the system.

I love the army men series also, back when I was managing funcoland I used to buy every army men game day 1 and play through them while the rest of the staff and customers mocked me for it. I never played the portable ones but if you like the series you definitely need to play the console versions of air attack, it was the one army men game that was critically well received and plays a lot like a more arcadey version of jungle/desert strike.

Re: Games Beaten 2018

Posted: Wed Feb 21, 2018 10:00 pm

by ElkinFencer10

pook99 wrote:I love the army men series also, back when I was managing funcoland I used to buy every army men game day 1 and play through them while the rest of the staff and customers mocked me for it. I never played the portable ones but if you like the series you definitely need to play the console versions of air attack, it was the one army men game that was critically well received and plays a lot like a more arcadey version of jungle/desert strike.

I have Air Combat on N64 as well as Air Attack on PS1. I just haven't played through them yet. I'm planning to do that sometime in the coming months. I also had Air Tactics on PC when I was a kid, but I sadly don't have that anymore. Air Combat: The Elite Mission on Gamecube is pretty good, too.